


Forget-me-not

by therev



Category: Star Trek, Star Trek: The Original Series
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-07
Updated: 2015-12-07
Packaged: 2018-05-05 13:18:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,876
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5376680
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/therev/pseuds/therev
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The end of a story. McCoy is a night person. He prefers even a simulated nighttime over any other kind of morning. Spock waits until the Enterprise lights are dim and finds him in med bay. Spock has something to tell him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Forget-me-not

**Author's Note:**

> Was originally supposed to be part of a Five Times story but it's been sitting around on its own for a little while now.

In the dimmed lights of their simulated nighttime, Spock found McCoy in med bay, leaning over a lighted table so that his face glowed from below and the square of it reflected in his eyes when he looked up. 

"Something I can help you with, Mr. Spock?" McCoy asked kindly. His good humor, Spock had noted over the course of the last one-point-seven-eight standard years, tended to increase as the Enterprise lowered her lights and for this reason Spock had sought him out as late as he could.

"Nothing specific at this time, Doctor. Merely curiosity." This was not unusual nor even untrue. Spock often observed the Doctor's experiments and the Doctor likewise Spock's, and he was always curious.

McCoy held a plant sample, a flowering species that Spock recognized from a recent landing. He turned it in his hand, considering it.

"I was just going through the samples from Argana III. I took extensive notes, all species scanned and catalogued as usual for later study, but this beauty..." he held the flower up to eye level so that Spock could not tell if the Doctor was admiring the delicate blue blossoms, perfectly preserved in stasis, or if he was in fact meeting Spock's gaze. "She's a stowaway. I couldn't find any record of her. No tag, no matching scan. Computer doesn't recognize the species but I'd guess some variety of myosotis." He held the flower out and Spock took it.

"Forget-Me-Not," Spock said, and McCoy smiled, eyes bright above the examination lights. 

"Yes, I hadn't missed the irony, Mr. Spock. Likely seeded there along with the original humanoids."

"These were quite numerous on the planet. Perhaps there is another sample which may provide the missing information."

"Not that I've found. It only matters for location data but, as you said, common as house cats."

Spock raised an eyebrow. "I do not recall any cats on the planet. It was, however, quite beautiful."

"Had a nice few days tromping through those fields, didn't we? Mild weather, friendly natives, and then there was that leaf they smoked. Thought it let them see the future."

"Did you, Doctor?"

McCoy grinned crookedly. "You know me too well, Mr. Spock," he said, and to his smile added a comely blush, but he did not answer Spock's question, only reached out to take the flower from Spock.

As Spock handed over the plant, he made an observation.

"If I may say so, Doctor, the coloration of these blossoms is a very close match to that of your eyes."

McCoy blinked and looked down and then up again. He looked around as if there might be someone else in the room. At last, he took the flower.

"Well I don't see how that's scientifically significant but I suppose you're right."

"Merely an observation. One might also observe a similarity to the Earth sky, as viewed from the planet's surface, on a clear afternoon."

"The flowers or my eyes?" McCoy asked, seeming amused now.

"Both, naturally," Spock said. "Although it is rarer, and therefore more remarkable, as an eye color. There are blue-eyed Vulcans, though few in number, since even in those earliest days, when diversity was highly sought after, it was quickly discovered that those children were more sensitive to our sun."

McCoy smiled wryly. "Nice to know yet another way in which I fail to live up to Vulcan superiority." He turned back to his table and the plant, separated a section and ran it through a scanner.

"It was not my intention to infer the inferiority or superiority of either species, merely to remark on one of your more distinctive traits, at any rate, that was several millennia in Vulcan's past." He paused, considered the disastrous effects of elaborating on the specifics of Vulcan eugenics, and decided he had better not. When McCoy only studied the plant Spock said, " Is it not true that many humans would consider comparison to the beauty of a flowering plant a compliment?"

"Well sure, but typically you'd leave out all the stuff about unfavorable genetics. People tend not to like being told they're genetically inferior."

Spock raised an eyebrow. "On the contrary, Doctor, for many species, including humans, and even now Vulcans, such rare traits may now be considered more sexually attractive, and therefore a superior feature for the purposes of securing a mate and continuing one's line."

"I didn't think Vulcans would succumb to any forces as autonomic as sexual attraction."

Spock clutched his hands behind his back. He could supply McCoy with ample evidence to the contrary if he was asked.

"You are mistaken," he said simply.

"And what if, Mr. Spock," McCoy continued, eyes still on his work but he smiled quite playfully, "blue eyes were linked to a lack of logic in the individual? Wouldn't that preclude any physical attraction?" 

"That is not a logical or likely link, Doctor."

"Which should prove my point, since I'm the one suggesting it!" McCoy said and laughed, made a note on his PADD and only glanced up at Spock before continuing his examination.

Spock sighed. "My point, Doctor," and he said this with as little annoyance as he could manage, "is that you have beautiful eyes."

McCoy went still, staring through the small view piece of the scanner. He slowly straightened and looked at Spock with suspicion, once again checking the room for other occupants, as if Spock could not have been speaking to him, even though they were the only ones in the room.

He opened his mouth as if to speak, then closed it. Then reached out for his bio scanner. It whirred to life in his hands and he waved it over Spock.

"How are you feeling? Any fever? When was your last physical? I'm sure you're due again."

Spock stood a little straighter. "I am well, Doctor, apart from an inability to make myself understood. Perhaps your resistance to comprehension is actually a form of politeness to spare me the embarrassment or pain you imagine I would experience from rejection, therefore I will save you the trouble and say good night."

Spock turned to leave but McCoy quickly stepped in front of him.

"Wait, Spock, I think there's been some miscommunication here, which is pretty usual for us but not in this… um, area." Away from the lighted table his face was darker, eyes softer.

"Which statement requires clarification?" 

McCoy frowned. "Well, I don't know… probably one you didn't say. What's this about rejection? You're welcome in my lab any time, you know that."

Spock took a breath. The room felt too cool suddenly. "I spoke of rejection of a romantic nature."

"You can't mean… me?" McCoy asked, so simply and stupidly that Spock ached to touch him.

"I can and I do. I did not expect it to be a surprise to you. I have sensed an attraction for some time. Or am I mistaken?"

Something flickered over McCoy's face like embarrassment, then he just shrugged. "Well…" he said slowly, looking down, "sure, I'm attracted to you, but I never thought that it could be returned." He looked up at last, eyes narrowed like he still wasn't sure he understood Spock correctly. Spock didn't know why he had a sudden pain in his side where his heart was, or perhaps he did know. At any rate, maybe the doctor was right and he was overdue for his physical.

"I can assure you, Doctor, that you were wrong."

There was a beep of machinery as the scanner concluded its work, and then the room became very silent in the seconds that followed, until at last McCoy smiled and bounced on his heels.

"I guess it wouldn't be the first time, would it, Mr. Spock?"

"Indeed not." 

They stood there for a moment longer until McCoy clearly grew impatient. "Well what now?"

"Now I might assist in your examination of the remaining flora collected from Argana III--"

"Or?" McCoy asked expectantly.

"Or," Spock continued, feeling suddenly lightheaded, as if there was too little air in the room, though McCoy seemed unaffected, "we might further discuss the details of a possible relationship, perhaps in a more private location. I would suggest my quarters or yours."

McCoy smiled and stepped away, but he was only packing up the plants and shutting down the scanner for the night. "I suppose discussion is the Vulcan way. We've got to work out the details logically? Plan the whole affair in advance?"

Spock stood behind McCoy, not very close but when McCoy turned and took a step they stood in each other's space.

"I was speaking metaphorically, Doctor."

"I was hoping you were," McCoy said quietly, and waited, another moment stretching out between them. The Doctor was only smiling, showing unusual patience, blue eyes closer than Spock had ever seen them except during exams. Spock still had not touched him. 

At last, McCoy raised his hand, two fingers extended. "Isn't this the way?" 

"It is," Spock said, and touched McCoy's fingers with his own. There was another skip in his side.

"And I know you kiss like a human, too. I've seen it." McCoy smirked and raised an eyebrow. Spock did not want to think about Zarabeth just then.

"Yes," was all that he said, then leaned forward and kissed McCoy, gentler, slower, shorter than he wanted, but when he leaned back McCoy looked pleased enough about it, and broke the connection of their fingers to hold Spock's hand instead. 

"If you were so sure I was attracted to you," McCoy asked, smiling crookedly, like he knew he was about to start an argument, "what took you so long?"

"Human attraction, like so many of your traits, can be inconsistent. I had to be sure it was not merely infatuation."

"Exactly how long have you known?"

"Known of your interest or of its precise nature?"

"Both, I guess."

"I sensed your attraction almost from the beginning of the mission," Spock said and McCoy's eyes widened. "I understood it to be comparable to my own regard precisely eighteen standard days ago."

"Comparable… well how long have you, I mean…" McCoy did not finish the question but Spock understood it.

"Long enough," he said, and hoped that McCoy would not ask him to be more precise. He was beginning to tire of talking. It was not in Vulcan nature, contrary to what McCoy might believe, to speak rather than act in these matters.

McCoy shook his head, "Well, nobody would have guessed it, least of all me." He stepped away but pulled Spock by the hand toward the door. Spock followed. He did not know where they were going. He did not ask.

"Is this okay?" McCoy asked when the door slid open and the dim hallway waited for them beyond. He squeezed Spock's hand in his. "Do you mind if anyone else sees us?"

"I do not."

McCoy smiled and that skip in Spock's side was more of a kick.

"Me neither. This ship could stand a few more public displays of affection." 

They stepped into the hall hand-in-hand, brushing shoulders when McCoy leaned in then away, before Spock pulled him back and they fell into an easy, matching stride, and the door snicked shut behind them.


End file.
